Plate 70: SPEAK with Helen Moses of Raleigh, NC

Plate 70 - SPEAK with Helen Moses of Raleigh, NC

Helen Moses is a voice and communication expert, a TEDx speaker coach, and owner of Speak Up Communications. Her mission in work and life is to help individuals and teams communicate with alignment, confidence, and empathy, building stronger and more lasting relationships that lead to greater fulfillment, efficiency, and results for all. Helen lives in Raleigh NC with her husband of 24 years, 16-year-old daughter, and two cats, and also has a son in college. She is an expert at making goofy faces, and, thanks to her father’s influence, is one of those rare people who admit to appreciating the pun-ishlingly bad humor in puns. https://helenmoses.com/ Plate Story News Feature: Ohio Plate Mistake Makes North Carolina Throw Shade. Enjoy this episode and want to buy me a cup of coffee? https://www.buymeacoffee.com/pl8story

Connect with Helen:

November 8, 2021 you are invited to attend her special Audio Book Launch and Birthday Celebration, no cost event at 7-8pm ET - perfect for Writers and Speakers - https://qe805.infusionsoft.app/app/form/audiobook-party

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/HelenMoses-SpeakUp

https://www.facebook.com/HelenMosesYourVoiceCoach

https://www.linkedin.com/in/helenmoses/

https://www.instagram.com/helenmoses.voicecoach/

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Episode Transcript

SPEAK

Hey there, Trista. Polo here with this week's plate story. We meet Helen. In this episode, she's a former speech therapist who specialized in aphasia losing your ability to speak from an injury or damage to your brain. She's moved into coaching now and loves the opportunity to help people find their voice at work and love and within themselves. Now can you guess her license plate it's SPEAK. Perfect, right? Helen is a voice and communication expert. She's a TEDx speaker, coach, and an author. Her book, Voice Unleashed: Speaking Faith and Courage comes out on audio November 8th (2021) and she's holding a launch party that'll be jam packed with content for writers and speakers alike. 

The event is free of charge and you should bring your own cake because it's also her birthday celebration. We talk about Helen's coaching style and her book. She also shares the lessons that she has learned about communication from her children. And her 24 year marriage to her husband, but first some plate story news. 

Ohio has a new license plate design. As the birthplace of the Wright brothers, they put the very first airplane on the top of the plate with a banner flying Behind the plane saying birthplace of aviation. Oops. Wait, that's not right. 

They put the banner on the wrong end. And it's actually flying from the front of the plane, making it look like the plane is flying in reverse. Well, that's a bit backwards. The plate design has been recalled and is being corrected. The new one will be available in mid December. And the error is costing a reprinting in the area of about 35,000 plates. 

I bet some of those misprints will show up on E-bay eventually. What do you think. When I heard this story about an Ohio plate, I thought it was odd because I remember visiting kitty Hawk where the first flight was, and I'm not great at geography, but I know I was in North Carolina, not Ohio. But since the Wright brothers were born in Ohio. 

They take credit as the birthplace of aviation. See what they did there. North Carolina department of transportation. Didn't miss the opportunity to take a dig at Ohio for this. Apparently the rivalry around this issue between the two states is about as old as flight itself. Because while the Wright brothers were born in Ohio. Their first flight was in kitty Hawk, North Carolina. There's a whole ripe brothers museum there, and you can even walk on the actual ground where the plane took off successfully for the first time. 

In reply to this mistake, hitting the news, the North Carolina department of transportation account tweeted, y'all leave Ohio alone. They wouldn't know they weren't there . Has an error like this ever happened, where you work, what happened and how did your organization resolve it? 

Leave a comment and let me know. Now let's go meet Helen. 

Welcome to this week's episode. I'm super excited to have Helen Moses. Her license plate is SPEAK and she's from Raleigh North Carolina. Welcome Helen. Hello, Trista. Thanks for having. Yeah, I'm so happy to have you. So tell me the story behind why you chose that as your license plate. Sure. Well, so speaking is very important to me. I am a coach for people who speak both in communication and in giving presentations. Empowering people's voices.

So speaking is very important to me and I want to encourage everyone else to use their voice. So I see it as a, you know, a incentive or an invitation, if you will, to people who are following me on the highway, speak, you know, your voice is important. And I, my business is called Speak Up Communications. So I actually looked for SPEAKUP and that wasn't available, but SPEAK was, and I thought, you know what? That's actually even better. I like that even better. So that's the real story behind it. I was just thrilled to get it and I love it every time I see it makes me very happy. I love that. And you believe in manifesting your life as well.

And you had shared when we first spoke that that's sort of the thought behind it as well, like speak your life into reality. Can you share a little bit about that? Yeah. Well, you know, You can speak things into existence. You can speak them out loud and then the vibrations affect the rest of the world.

Right? The other people hear it. You are held more accountable for it. You and more people are on the lookout for it. Of course. God spoke the Universe into existence, according to what I believe. And so that's pretty powerful stuff that we can do with our voices. So if we speak something out loud, there's so much more likelihood that it's going to actually come to be.

Yeah, I believe that as well. I think that we create our lives on purpose. So I'm very on board with all of that. I'd love to hear. How have you used the manifesting, the speaking things into existence to create the life you have now?

I, I, haven't always been as good at it as I am currently and will continue to become, but. I said, I would say that in the past 10 years, a little more than five, five to eight years, maybe I've been on a journey. I find myself having completed the hardest part, what I think. And I hope it's the hardest part of this journey so far, but I didn't start out as a voice coach with a true understanding of the value of my own voice and my own personal worth.

And that. Didn't allow me to manifest things with my voice, because I wasn't speaking in my truth. I wasn't aligned with my truth and the value that I didn't recognize that I had. So since I, I got, I had a coach who kind of called me out on that. I was saying, I can help people sound confident when they speak.

And she said, well, You, you can't do that because I've never heard you sound confident when you speak. Wow. So that was a hard thing, as you can imagine, it feels like they're just kind of knocked off your feet there. And in that moment I was just kinda stunned and shocked. And, and exposed, you know, kind of felt exposed like, oh my gosh, she's just shown everybody that I'm a fake, but as I have reconciled myself with that, I kept coaching with her.

I didn't stop. That turned out to be one of the best gifts I've ever received. Was that awareness that I was hiding still part of me was still hiding. So to, since then, I've done several things to speak up with heart, to speak up with faith and courage. One of them is, is my book. It's called Voice Unleashed: Speak Up with Faith and Courage. My story of how that came to be. And then of course, I, I, it's not just about me. I wrote this for people who might be on a similar journey and want to understand some things they can think about that might help them move to the next. So the book happened and something else really exciting about the book happened.

When I spoke and asked, took, took the time, took the courage, did the preparation to ask. Someone that I wasn't sure would have the time or interest in writing the forward for that book. And I did, I asked Bishop Michael Curry to write it and he did write it. And he's internationally known. And from the Episcopal church, he preached at Prince Harry and Meghan Markel's wedding.

I had some connections to him at which I, I leveraged, but ultimately I, I asked him. If he would do it and that's something I could never have imagined doing before. Having that belief that what I had to say was, was worth asking someone like him with, with the voice, as powerful as his, to, lend his voice to my book.

And and I asked him if he would read it for the audio book version. So his voice is there in my audio book, reading the foreword. That's amazing. It's pretty amazing. He's an amazing man. Yeah. And it just shows that speaking isn't just about speaking out.

It's also about making requests and being willing to ask for help. Being willing to be vulnerable. I have a very similar journey to yours. I was an amazing speaker. I was a powerful leader. I was all that and a bag of chips and it was all an act. It was not authentic. It was me pretending. So nobody would really see what a piece of crap I thought of myself and I went through my own journey of really facing that reality and realizing, you know, you first you have to admit you have a problem. Right.

You know, just kind of figuring out who I was, owning who I was and then being it authentically. And so to a lot of people who knew me then know me now to them I'm the same. But the difference is now I really believe it myself, instead of hoping you believe it over there, because I don't believe it myself. So self-worth, you talked about has a huge impact on who I was and who I am now.

And it sounds like it has for you as well. So how has self-worth played a role in that journey? Well, before I went on the journey to discover my self-worth and, and claim it and, and recognize I needed to do it. That was kind of that awareness that you're talking about. Right. It's, it's trans it's transformational the work to, to find your self worth, to understand it.

And. You know, I I've come to this revelation. That's nothing new. It's been there as old as the universe that, that all creations, all human beings are of equal value and equal worth. There's really nothing that anyone can do to change their value or their worth. Now they can make choices and have behaviors caused them to get into trouble or cause people to want to avoid them, or, you know, they can choose behaviors, but they can't, they can't cancel their own value or their own worth. And so I just know too many people that are going around unable to see that they .. that they matter.

Unable to see that their voice both literally and metaphorically can make a big difference. And it is meant to, you know, it's not just a one day. Everyone can speak up and make a difference. It's no, it's just living your life and living it with some sense of purpose that. Speaking out loud, living your life out loud, following your purpose out loud.

And so for the self-worth piece for people out there who may be going, I don't really understand what my value is. I don't really understand how I can be worth something because X, Y, and Z, all these things happened to me. I never did this. I'm not good enough. I want to help people reframe that and see everything

that they've experienced so far, all of their choices, so far, all of their relationships, all of their ideas and dreams and talents and everything, all of it is part of what their voices today and what makes it so valuable and it's unique because nobody else has it. So I get really excited when I started finding a way to share that with people. And when I see someone have that transformation that you and I have both been through of not having to show up as an act or perform or pretend to be somebody they're not, but they can actually feel like, yes, I can just be Helen. I can just be Trista today. I don't have to do anything else.

That's enough. That's all that matters that. Lights me up, like nothing else when that happens. And I see that transformation. Hmm. I love that. Before you were a coach, you were your. Well, right. That's right. I worked as a speech language pathologist or speech therapist, and the majority of the people that I worked with were people who had aphasia or some other language for speech impairment due to a brain injury or a stroke.

And aphasia is when your language is impaired, it affects your ability to speak, understand, write, read in all various kinds of ways. One thing that's clear from all the research is that no one person's aphasia affects them exactly the same as anyone else's. But I had the privilege, I would say to work with these folks who had suddenly had their voice literally sometimes and metaphorically taken away from them and their family.

No, this is a very fundamental need to be able to communicate with people that we love and do that on a daily basis, share our hearts and our thoughts. And when that's just taken away from you suddenly, I mean, that's enormous in terms of an impact on you. So I learned when I worked with them, I was like, look, oh my gosh, these people went from one afternoon being fine to that night, not being fine. I'm not going to take my voice for granted. And I want to share that message with the world. Don't take your voice for granted. We take everything for granted, all of it. I mean, whoever, everyone can come up with something, don't take whatever for granted, for me. It's the voice. Don't take your voice for granted.

It is, it is such an amazing gift for you and for everybody else who hears it, you know, your insights, your opinions could mean the difference between. Something not going very well. And something that creates a movement down the road. I mean, it really matters. And your ability to connect with people really matters.

So that's, that's one of the things that I got from that work as a speech therapist, I don't work officially as a speech therapist anymore, but I certainly rely heavily on my training and my experience. Helping people regain a sense of communication and connection. When I do coach my clients. Yeah. That's what I was going to ask is how much of that training do you bring into coaching I have a whole toolbox full of public speaking techniques, competence, building techniques, ways to get insights on what matters to you. And what's important for you to speak up about .

Yeah, absolutely. So who are your clients? What are people looking to achieve when they hire you as a coach? Like what are the issues they're asking for? They're they're coming in. They're saying I can't get out of my head. I'm always all my thoughts in my head. I can't be present when I'm speaking to people, I'm always worried about how I'm going to come across.

That's one thing people will tell me. I've had people tell me, I just got moved into this new position. And I want to make sure that the people that are reporting to me and the people that I'm reporting to know that I actually belong here, I've I deserve, or I have earned the right to be in this position.

I've also had people tell me they want to get to the next level. And for whatever reason, they keep getting overlooked. And so they want me to help and help them figure it out. What might it be? Is there anything about the way they talk or, or speak up or adult that could be causing them to not get promoted or not get seen and recognized the way they want to?

Those are some .People tell me sometimes it's just a quick a client who has a presentation coming up and we just work on making sure that it fits and a. What they want it to accomplish. And so that those are shorter term clients, but the ones who stay with me three to six months, typically they are the ones who are there speakers or entrepreneurs or professionals who speak or give presentations lead meetings.

And what ha what they all have in common is that they don't have a clear understanding of their value. Or how to leverage that, how to communicate that, how to speak in a way that reflects that value so that others can see it without being arrogant or egotistical or, or condescending any. That makes sense.

I was thinking about public speakers or people who were afraid of public speaking, or wanted to be public speakers or wanting to be better public speakers. You could probably help people in those categories very easily as well. Yes, very much so. Yeah. Awesome. Now you have a book. It is just out on audio and you are having a launch party for it.

So let's talk about that because that's very exciting. It is exciting. It is exciting. I published my paperback version and the ebook about a year ago in September of 2020. So I'm celebrating the one year anniversary of the birth, the first birthday of that. The audio book just came out last month. And so it's the, the birth of the audio book as well, which is in my voice.

And of course, Bishop Curry's voice for the forward. But that, that's very exciting. So I'm having this party it's on zoom and anyone can come. We're going to celebrate people's voices. Through writing and through speaking in audio books. So I'm hoping that we'll get a lot of people who either have always wanted to write a book or have written books, but that can come and share and talk about their ideas and what they've written about, or want to write about whether or not they would want to do an audio book version.

Would they want to speak, if not, who would they. Whose voice would they want to speak for their audio book? So it's just questions like that. To get excited, to have someone from the studio where I did the recording to come and talk about what that experience is like and answer people's questions. And I'll have a few little things to give away throughout the party as well.

Oh. And they're like fun. Oh, very important. Bring your own cake. Because it's a birthday celebration

also happens to be my own birthday. So I want to share my birthday with all these other people who have these amazing ideas about books and that sort of thing. So, but you bring your own cake. That's. That's beautiful. I love it's not just a launch for you, but you're providing a ton of value for your attendees and it's open to everyone, right?

Any. Is there a fee for it? There's no fee. No. Okay. So it's a party show up and, and get great value and help you celebrate your birthday. That's right. For one hour, what starts at 7:00 PM? Eastern time on November 8th, which is a Monday. I love it. I love it. I love it. So, in addition to speaking, you use your voice for something else as well.

I do. I like to sing. Yay. Where do you do most of your singing? Most of it is at My church at my choir. I'll tell you this recently, I had the honor of singing at a funeral and this was for a man who was in his nineties, actually a world war two veteran and his wife, because they both died during COVID.

They finally got to have the Memorial Memorial service, but this man heard me singing at my church 20 years ago, maybe. And ever since then, he kept telling me. I want you to sing at my funeral. I want you to sing. I'm serious, Helen. I want you to sing. So I I kept telling him, yes, yes, sir. I will do that.

And you have to promise me to make that as far away from now as possible. So he did his job. It took him about 20 years before that happened, and I felt his presence. And, you know, just what an honor to be able to do that for, for him, for his wife, for the family, for the people there. And to be. To be able to give of my voice is pretty special.

And even every Sunday, just singing with the choir feels really good. I've had few occasions to sing in a band type situation and. I kind of love that. I kind of love being behind the microphone and singing in a different way than, than what I typically do in church. And of course I'm a classically trained singer.

That was my college degree, my bachelor's degree. And that's very, very formulaic, very technique oriented. And I'm grateful for that, but sometimes just that free flowing, just singing from the heart. That's the experience I had behind those microphones. The few times I had those where I just could be free and let my voice go without worrying about the technique.

And what kind of music were you singing in? The bands that you participated in? One of them was a. Church band that I had assembled, not because it was an event, a woman's event. In fact, this this cover is from a painting that I had commissioned to remind me of that experience of singing. And that was when I kind of let go of my, the expectations and the fear that I had, that the people in my church who weren't used to this kind of music would kick me out of the choir or w I mean, I really worried about.

That never happened, but I really did worry about that. Because it, it's funny how we have so many fears and the majority of them are just unfounded. They're so much, they're so unfounded and we press them on everything and we believe them and then we believe them and they're not true. And so that's one question that I'll ask people all the time is what you know, who said that.

Well, you know, they'll say this is going to happen. This is not going to be good. And I'll say, well, who, whose voice are you hearing? Who said that? And maybe there's a voice from their past a parent, someone critical, but most of the time they pause like, well no one actually said that. Right. Yeah, for sure.

Now I wanted to ask you, you talk a lot about speaking and speaking your truth and speaking up and speaking your love life into existence. What are your thoughts on listening? Oh gosh. I'm so glad you asked that question. Okay. Because yes, I'm all about speaking, but you've also heard me use the word communication, which is a two way.

And one of the things that I am becoming more and more drawn to is how I can be helpful and influential and, and bringing people who have different opinions to a table to have a conversation, not an argument. Not an elevation of everybody's voices, but a true conversation. And that cannot happen without listening.

That that has to be the first step. We talked earlier about how there's value in everyone's voice, so that mindset needs to be in play. And sometimes the best way you can speak up is to listen and not just be in silence while they're talking. And plan the next thing you're going to say, aha. Well, I'm going to, I'm going to counter that argument.

But listen with curiosity, listen, to try to understand why they feel the way they do. What's led them to that because I argue that even if what we believe is irrational or could be proven for. There's a reason why we stand up and say, we believe this something has led us to this point, some series of things.

And that's where we can start to find something in common. That's the other thing, when you listen, look for what you have in common with the other person, sometimes you have to start with, well, we're both human beings.

Back to basics if we need to, right. Sometimes we have to start there. And I think this whole concept of speaking up with heart and speaking with empathy is totally about listening as a component of that, it can't happen without it.

Yeah. Because if there's somebody speaking and there's no one listening, it's like the tree in the forest. It is right. Yeah. It doesn't make any difference. I love that analogy. What, of course the tree makes noise. That's the question? Does the tree make any noise? Well, yes, of course it does, but does it matter.

 I love that now. You're not just a coach. You're also a mom and a wife. Tell me a little about your personal side. Okay. I have I have been married for 24 years now.

We met through my church and he is very much a good balance for me. We are and what they say, opposites attract. We are opposites in many ways, which has been very good because we, we kind of balance each other out. We have two children, we have a son who's 21 in his fourth year at college and a daughter who is 16.

She's a junior in high school. And it has been quite the honor and the challenge to be their mother. I have learned so much, they have taught me more than anything else in this world. No one else. No course I've ever taken no coach that I've coached with, not even my husband and he's taught me a lot.

I have taught me as much as my two children. And the main thing that they have taught me is just to talk about using your voice authentically, you know, I used to worry so much about them and what would happen to them because they, you know, they have their own challenges. Both of them have had anxiety and depression.

That's something that's fairly common. So I can say that without going into details, but Especially when they were in those, those moments, I would worry so much and then I would speak to them and they would kind of shut me out. And they've taught me that I was bringing in this energy and this voice that they interpreted as criticism or disappointment and that.

And I was just trying to find the words. I mean, there's so many times I would like walk away and go, dang, I can't even, I don't even know what to say. I can even talk to my own children. But in those moments now I don't try. I just show up. I say, I love you. That's it. That's that's all I do. Sometimes that's so much more powerful than asking them questions that come across to them as, as criticism and judgment that they're not good enough. That's the last thing I want to show them with the way I speak. So of course, I think they've taught me a lot. And I also think they've been watching me and it's been fun to see them begin to advocate for themselves and find some joy and a little bit of purpose in their lives.

That's been really fun and I, and I will tell you that I will take a little bit of credit for. Modeling some things that have been positive for them. And that's something I wouldn't have tried to do before, because that sounded too arrogant or whatever, but I think more moms need to recognize and dads need to recognize that what they say and do does matter.

And especially the good stuff. It really does make a difference.

Absolutely. Well, thank you for sharing a little bit about your family life. And I'm just thinking about, you know, my friends and family that have children and are raising them and I'm sure that. There's a lot of that. I just want the best for you and what the child hears is, you know, maybe get off my back or you're judging me or I'm not good enough.

And it just reminds me that, like you said earlier, Communication's a two way street. It's not just what we're saying. It's how, what we're saying is landing for the other person. And I think that there is a gift in being willing to be responsible for how we're heard. My husband and I have been married for 25 years.

And he, I come from a family where the, my grandparents were married for over 50 years. I mean, they were married until my grandfather passed and that they would yell at each other really loud, you know? And so for me, like that's part of being married is sometimes you yell really loud and he can't be with it it's it doesn't work for him.

And so he's gotten really good at being able to say, you're yelling at me and I need you to stop yelling at me. And then I can say, oh yeah, that's. That worked in my grandparents' marriage. It doesn't work here. And then I can be responsible for doing, you know, for impacting him with my communication. And then I can change what I, so it's like a two-way street.

Like I have to be responsible for how my communication lands. I have to also be responsible about how your communication is landing for me. And that is advanced communication, right? When we can both be responsible, not only for what we're saying, but how we're being heard as well.

Very, very advanced 25 years of marriage. You got to figure it out, right? You've been married 24 years. Anybody who's been married. Probably even over 10 years knows that if you're still happy, you're doing it on purpose and it takes work for it. It does. It's not a fairy tale. It's not a happily ever after.

And they rode off into the sunset. Maybe that's good for a year. Yeah, that's about it. Oh my gosh. You just reminded me that early on in. I think it was after we were married. We, we dated for five years before we got married. So I think it was after we got married. But anyway, early on in our relationship, my husband would say to me, don't use that teacher voice with me.

And I thought, well, how can I help it? I mean, I'm just trying to explain something to you. Right. And I got the first, I just got really mad, but he hasn't accused me of that in a long time. And I think that's because I've done the work to change. Something about the teacher voice was negative to him. And probably in those moments, what was most important to me was to be right.

And that's why it came across as the teacher, the negative. So recognizing what's behind what you're saying is also valuable. And part of this process that we experienced as we age in our marriages and other relationships is what, what are we, what's the purpose behind what we say? Why are we saying what we say?

And when someone tells us a response that we're coming across in a way that we, we think we didn't intend maybe. Underneath we did. And it's worth a little bit of self examination and trying to let things go and reframe things and come across in a different way. Yeah, absolutely. But you have so much knowledge about not just speaking from the clinical side, but also speaking your truth and you're clearly really out to help people raise up.

Worth. And I'm all about that too. So I really acknowledge you for the work you're doing. I congratulate you for your book and having it come out on audio. And there will be a link in the show notes, not only to your YouTube channel and ways people can connect with you, but if they want to participate and join in on the celebration and get that awesome.

Content that you're offering as your book launch audio book launch, we'll have that in the show notes for people as well.

 I just love your mission in the world, and I wish you all the best with it, especially with your launch. So I hope that there will be people listening to this that will show up and be part of the. And I want to thank you so much for being on today. Well, it has been really fun. I've enjoyed it a lot and thank you.

Thank you for the time. Absolutely. Thank you so much, Helen. I wish you all the best and we will see you soon. Sounds good. 

Thanks for listening. Please subscribe to Trista's plate story podcast, share it, or leave a review. If you would like to nominate a license plate to be featured in a future episode or you have an interesting plate story news item to share with me, leave us a comment or visit plate story.com. That's P L number 8. story.com and give me all the details. 

This is Trista polo wishing you well on the road to your next adventure.